


came from a long line of drinkers and dreamers

by hypotheticalfanfic



Series: and the dog bites down a little harder [1]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Daughters, Disappointment, F/F, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Racism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-19
Updated: 2016-02-19
Packaged: 2018-05-21 15:29:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6056758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hypotheticalfanfic/pseuds/hypotheticalfanfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Reboot daughters, a trio of short fics. This one's about Jo McCoy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	came from a long line of drinkers and dreamers

“You have never lived up to our expectations.” A frown, two wrinkled cheeks pulled downward, dark eyebrows flecked with gray curling in on each other.

“Well, your expectations were bullshit.” The bite of whiskey, a sharp gleam in dark eyes. “Should’ve known better.” The slap, when it comes, makes her see stars, makes blood spike coppery and warm into her mouth. Jo shows every one of her teeth, tilts her chin up. “That all you got, old man?”

He’s never beaten the edge off her, and he’s tried. She is unafraid of him, of his slaps, of anything he can do to her. She is iron, steel, a razor and a sword and a standing stone, and he cannot touch her. No one can. Nobody’s beaten the drawl out of her voice yet. Let people think she’s the dumb hick they thought Daddy was. Let ‘em, and then let her at ‘em, and they’ll see who ends up with the smile and drawl and drink in hand. Spoiler: it’s gonna be her. It’s always her.

The old man, Pete, Momma’s dad, doesn’t care for Jo. Never has. Doesn’t care for how she smears her eyeliner, how she paints her lips red, how she downs whiskey just like Daddy did, how she runs around with wild boys and wilder girls. He looks at her and sees sin and degradation, and she laughs in his face to rub it in deeper. Daddy’s dad’s been dead a long time, so she’ll never have a good comparison to hold up beside the old man, but she’d consoled herself many a night with the thought that if Daddy’s dad had ever met Pete there would’ve been a reckoning to shake the mountain to pieces.

Every time Daddy left her there with the old man to go gallivant in space, it hurt a little less. Like a slap a day, she got used to it. It helped that he always left her with some credit and a reminder to go to Starfleet if she ever…he never specified, never finished that sentence. Just told her that Starfleet would take care of her. “Walk into any damn recruitment center and tell ‘em your name, baby, and they’ll take care of you.” Whatever that meant to him, to her it had always been a last ditch escape valve. No matter what Pete said or did, no matter who looked sideways at her, no matter how many boys thought with their dicks and the booze on their breath, she knew she had that at least: a place to go where, at worst, they’d give her a job.

She’d been aboard the _Enterprise_ twice, maybe three times. She liked seeing Daddy there, liked how his cantankerous side sparked out when his captain poked him, liked watching him argue with the Vulcan officer (and she knew that argument was a joy for him, knew how much he relished being pushed like that, knew it was the whole reason she even existed). But ships in general made her antsy, and she’d never been able to sleep without the sound of crickets and creaking old willow trees. Starfleet wasn’t ever going to be her place of refuge, nor the _Enterprise_ itself.

But other things came from Starfleet, too: she and Daddy weren’t rich by any stretch. Bullshit on the post-money society the propaganda proclaimed, she’d had that fight with Daddy half a hundred times. Maybe out there in the sky they used goodwill for cash and everybody had plenty, but back home barter and credit still worked best. Even so, they made their way without having to ask for too much help, and never once asking Momma’s family for a dime despite their money as old as the forest on their land. She wasn’t ever hungry or hurt or sick or naked unless she wanted to be, and while she never dressed like the Saroyan sisters or drove a brand-new hover, she never wore rag-picked hand-me-downs either. Helped being the only girl born into the family in four generations, that lack of hand-me-downs, but the result was the same.

Summers were the worst. Spending time with Momma wasn’t bad, not really, but being stuck on the swampy part of the planet blew chunks in her humble opinion. Momma didn’t hold with drinking or bad behavior, and unlike Pete, Momma had long since earned real respect, so Jo didn’t break the rules. Used her full first name instead of Jo, dressed like a nice young lady instead of a motorcycle vigilante, spoke her best instead of dropping and slurring and slanging her way through. She didn’t drink besides maybe a mint julep here and there with dinner, a sip of white wine at a benefit dinner, nothing too much. She even put on a happy face at the stupid fucking debutante events Momma ran.

The one time Joanna Eleanor Martina McCoy pointed out in her sweetest voice that debutante ball and the whole coming out for marriage culture was patriarchal bullshit and racist to boot, Momma had confined her to her room for the rest of the summer. Never let it be said that Jo’s daddy had the worst temper of the three of them, because Mary-Ellen Verlon Haverman McCoy Jones was beautiful and terrifying and brilliant and too much to be around. Jo couldn’t be there all year, couldn’t live as the white-pinafore version of herself she knew Momma preferred. So she made her excuses when the leaves started to fall, all about old Pete out there by his lonesome, needing someone to cook his dinner and make sure he didn’t fall asleep with a cigar and burn the whole place down. Momma knew the truth well enough, but knew, too, that Jo needed the whole year to recover from summers on the ranch. They called it a ranch, didn’t call it a plantation, not after the Great Fourth of July Debacle, but that’s what it was, sure as shit.

Jo’s longest-running casual partner, because she didn’t do serious and didn’t tend to keep ‘em around long, snorted when Jo tells the story about Pete’s most recent slap. “And so I said to him, ‘that all you got, old man?’ just like I was in a movie or something.”

“And then he, what, kicked the shit out of you?” Nurtaj frowned at the offending bruises. “Hold still, Jo, let me get it wrapped.”

“It’s nothin’, babe, I’m fine. Just riled up.”

The dark-skinned woman sighed. “Yeah, I bet. I just bet you’re fine. I’m only the top-ranked medical student on the whole goddamned planet. Not like I know a thing about broken ribs.”

“I trust you, babe, you—“ she gasped and swore with the kind of fluid creativity that would have knocked Pete back two steps and made Daddy laugh.

“What did I say about swearing at me when I’m fixin’ you up for free?” Nurtaj hid a smile, but only just.

“I didn’t swear at you, I swore at the shit you’re doin’ to my ribs. That shit hurts!”

“Really? I’m so surprised. I’ve never once heard someone complain that letting a racist old shitbag kick them in the ribs ‘cause they don’t have the sense God gave a goose, that it hurts. That’s so shocking. I’ll have to write to Starfleet, let your daddy know about the incredible scientific discovery his darlin’ girl just made.” A last wrenching, a final tightening of the bandages. “There, you big baby. All done.”

Jo took a few experimental breaths. “It feels better.” Turned to Nurtaj, took her cheek in her hand. “Thank you, really. I mean it.”

“I know you do, honey. Just wish this wasn’t so normal.” They kissed softly, fondly, Nurtaj pointedly ignoring the insinuating hand creeping up her thigh.

“You know, babe, you’re welcome to stay. Here, I mean. With me.”

“I probably ought to, make sure you don’t have a concussion.”

“Be a shame to die alone in my sleep.”

“You’ll die a hundred ways before that one, Jo.”

Jo’s face went serious, a sudden shift. “I’m not bein’ clear. You’re welcome to stay tonight, and for a while. I like havin’ you around.”

“You proposin’ to me, Joanna McCoy?” Nurtaj put on the simpering face of a holo heroine. “How utterly romantic.”

Jo let herself smile at that. “Nah. You know me. But I would like for you to stay for a while. If you’ll have me.”

“Mmm, I’ve got to be back at the Bimaristan on Tuesday. Got that new crop of interns to scare.”

“So stay until Monday.”

“I suppose I could stay until Monday, if you’d like.”

They smiled at each other, easy and soft. Jo McCoy is never gonna be the settle down type, but she’s no spacefarer either. Right about here will suit her just fine.

**Author's Note:**

> title from "Sweet Lorraine" - Patty Griffin
>
>> Sweet Lorraine the fiery haired brown eyed schemer  
> Who came from a long line of drinkers and dreamers  
> Who knew that sunshine don't hold up to dark  
> Whose businesses fail  
> Who sleeps in the park


End file.
